Accelerating the controlled synthesis of WO3 photoanode by modifying aerosol-assisted chemical vapour deposition for photoelectrochemical water splitting

• Main Authors: Arzaee, Nurul Affiqah, Noh, Mohamad Firdaus Mohamad, Aadenan, Amin, Mumthas, Inzamam Nawas Nawas, Ab Hamid, Fatin Farihan, Kamarudin, Nurul Nadhirah, Mohamed, Nurul Aida, Ibrahim, Mohd Adib, Ismail, Aznan Fazli, Teridi, Mohd Asri Mat
• Format: Article
• Published: Pergamon-Elsevier Science Ltd 2022
• Subjects: TA Engineering (General). Civil engineering (General); TP Chemical technology
• Online Access: http://eprints.um.edu.my/42989/
• Institution: Universiti Malaya

Aerosol-assisted chemical vapour deposition (AACVD) is capable of producing WO3 film with good optical and electrical properties for photoelectrochemical (PEC) water splitting. However, the conventional AACVD method is time-consuming because post-annealing treatment is usually required after WO3 film was deposited under nitrogen flow. Therefore, we omitted the post-annealing treatment by employing purified air as carrier gas (known as one-step) instead of nitrogen (known as two-step) which decreases the fabrication time by 13-fold. One-step WO3 also shows improved charge separation and PEC reaction due to the coexistence of (0 0 2), (0 2 0) and (2 0 0) facets and higher oxygen vacancies. Further optimiza-tion using acetone/ethanol as solvent, 10 min deposition time and 450 degrees C deposition temperature leads to photocurrent density of 0.32 mA cm(-2) at 1.23 V-RHE, which is the highest performance reported for AACVD-based WO3 photoanode. The development of rapid and industrially applicable deposition method would pave the way for real practice of PEC technology. (C) 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.